The wall or ceiling, from far enough back to see the floor
Height, obstacles, and the run all live in the wide shot. A close-up of a switch says nothing about how the wire gets to it.
Electrical / ELC
Quoting and job management software for electrical businesses
Customers photograph the work area and the closed panel. Mason asks the electrical questions, prices device and fixture work off your rates, and sends troubleshooting and panel work straight to your desk.
Quoting and follow-up work today. Booking, crews, and invoicing are not built yet, and the section that covers your calendar says so.
Join the waitlistIntake / What electrical customers get asked
Questions a homeowner can answer.
Looking, counting, and pacing off a distance. That is all any of these take. Nothing here asks a customer to identify wire, read a breaker, or touch anything live.
- 01
What stopped working — one outlet, one room, or half the house?
One device can suggest a local repair. Half the house can suggest a circuit, service, or panel issue. The answer is evidence for triage, never a diagnosis.
- 02
Did you reset the breaker, and did it go again right away?
An immediate trip can point to a fault. A trip under load can point to overload or an equipment fault. Both come to you as evidence, not as a diagnosis.
- 03
Count the switches on the plate, then count how many switches turn that same light on and off.
One switch or a three-way changes what is in the wall and how long the tech is in the ceiling.
- 04
Can you reach the fixture from a step stool, or does it need a ladder taller than the one you own?
Height sets the ladder, the second person, and whether the fixture goes up in twenty minutes or takes the morning.
- 05
Is there already a box and wire where the new thing goes, or is it a blank wall?
An existing box is a swap. A blank wall is a new run, and the run is most of the price.
- 06
Walk from your panel to where the car parks and count your steps.
That walk is the wire. Feet of run and what it passes through are the two biggest numbers on a charger quote.
- 07
Where is the panel, and is there a clear three feet of floor in front of it?
Working space is not negotiable. A panel behind a shelving unit adds a conversation before it adds a price.
- 08
Is the work in a finished wall, an unfinished basement, a garage, or an attic?
Open framing is quick. Fishing a finished wall is not, and that gap is where estimates get lost.
Photos / The shots that matter for electrical
Wide first. Then the device.
One instruction rides on every electrical photo request, and it never changes:
Show the work area and closed panel label. Never open a panel.
The device with the plate still on
Gang count, existing dimmers, and plate condition come off this one. It also shows what is not there — no box means a new opening.
The closed panel with the label readable
The directory and the amperage on the label tell your team what to load on the van. The cover stays where it is.
The path the wire has to take
Basement joists, an attic hatch, a garage wall, a soffit. If the run is open, the quote can be exact. If it disappears into finished drywall, it cannot.
The service entrance and meter, from the ground
For anything touching the service, your team needs the mast, the weather head, and where the utility lands. From the ground. Nobody climbs.
The room with the furniture still in it
A fixture over a stairwell, a bed under the box, a finished ceiling below the work. Furniture and finish are labor, and labor is the quote.
If a shot is missing or blurry, the customer gets one clear request for a better one.
Pricing / How electrical quotes get built
Per device, per opening, per foot of run.
Mason prices from the rates you already use. It does not set a rate and it does not average one out of thin air.
The units the rate sheet prices in
- Per device: outlet, switch, dimmer, smoke, fan control.
- Per fixture, split by ceiling height and by whether a box is already there.
- Per opening for recessed cans, priced one way from an accessible attic and another way from below a finished ceiling.
- Per circuit for the home run, by feet and by what the wire has to pass through.
- Per panel or per service, by amperage, with permit and inspection as their own lines.
- Troubleshooting by the hour or as a set diagnostic charge, with your minimum and after-hours rate on top.
What moves the number on site
Open framing against fishing a finished wall. Attic height and attic heat. Ceiling height and whether the fixture hangs over stairs. Distance back to the panel. And whether drywall patch and paint sit inside your scope or outside it — most shops leave both out, and the quote has to say so out loud instead of finding out on the phone later.
What cannot be priced from photos
Troubleshooting. Flickering lights have no price until somebody finds out why, and no photo finds out why. Whether the panel has room or capacity for another circuit sits behind a cover nobody is opening for an estimate. Whether an outlet is grounded — a three-prong face proves nothing, a tester does. Load for a service change or a charger is a calculation, not a picture. Aluminum branch wiring and old cloth wire need eyes on them. Each of those comes back to you as a company review or an on-site look, with the photos already in the file.
Six existing outlets swapped in place, plates photographed, same locationsExact quote
Ceiling fixture replaced, eight-foot ceiling, box already in placeExact quote
New outlet on a finished exterior wallPrice range
Breaker trips every time the dryer runsOn-site look
A lot of electrical shops carry a second trade on the same service agreement. The HVAC and plumbing pages cover how those quotes come in. Pricing covers every trade you run.
Calendar / What electrical jobs need
Coming soonThe utility and the inspector set your day.
Booking is not built yet. Scheduling is where it will live. These are the things it has to answer to before it touches an electrical board.
- 01
A panel change means a dark house
That is a morning start and a customer who was told the day before, not the hour before.
- 02
The utility owns the disconnect
Their window is the job window. Nothing about a service change is scheduled around your preference.
- 03
Rough-in passes before drywall goes up
Book the inspection first. The drywaller goes after it, not next to it.
- 04
A failed inspection costs the next slot too
Leave the room for it instead of pretending it never happens.
- 05
Attic work is a morning job
In July nobody is up there at two in the afternoon, and a calendar that books it anyway is lying to the crew.
- 06
Masts and meters wait on weather
Outside service work does not happen in the rain, and that call gets made early.
- 07
Crew size is part of the booking
A service call is one van. A service change is two people, and that has to be one decision, not two separate ones.
Straight answers
What electricians ask us first.
01Will it quote a troubleshooting call?
It quotes your diagnostic charge, not the repair. The repair gets priced once your tech knows what is actually wrong. Anything else would be a made-up number, and a made-up number is how you lose the second call.
02Can it price a service upgrade or an EV charger from photos?
No. Both depend on a load calculation, on what the panel has left in it, and on the utility. Mason collects the panel shots, the run, and the parking spot, then hands the job to you as an on-site look.
03Will a customer ever be told to open a panel?
No. The instruction is fixed and Mason cannot remove it: Show the work area and closed panel label. Never open a panel.
04I price per device with a trip charge. Does that fit?
That is the shape it expects. You load your rates, confirm what Mason found in them, and set your minimum and the lowest price it is allowed to reach.